


Just Another Pretty Face

by bigfrakkingheroes



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-09
Updated: 2015-11-09
Packaged: 2018-04-30 20:48:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5179115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bigfrakkingheroes/pseuds/bigfrakkingheroes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(SPECTRE spoilers!) When James Bond loses his ability to recognize faces, it's up to Q to put him back together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Another Pretty Face

**Author's Note:**

> I loved SPECTRE but was incredibly disappointed when they threw in that awesome detail that Blofeld destroyed Bond's ability to recognize faces and then it was never mentioned again. This is my attempt to right that wrong.

James Bond changes after his encounter with Blofeld.

The man played with his brain. Surgically. And no smooth, silver-tongued charm can talk his way out of that. The truth of the matter is, there are parts of Bond that simply don’t work anymore. He gets headaches, wild, painful migraines. And then there’s the Prosopagnosia. Try as he might, faces have become a Picasso-like enigma to Bond. He can recognize a person by the sound of their voice, the cut of their clothes, and the gait of their walk. But faces are lost to him.

He loses Madeleine after a time and doesn't give anyone a straight answer about what happened. The truth is, he doesn't have to: once an M16, always an M16. Only M has grounded Bond until he can tell his friends from his foes. A trying task for the already jaded assassin.

It doesn’t stop Q from trying to put his broken toy back together, though.

“Left or right,” Q says, patiently holding up two photo portraits. One image has Le Chiffre, the other, M. Two faces Bond should be more than familiar with, and yet he can't seem to tell them apart.

“I’m hanging low and slightly to the right, thank you for noticing,” Bond responds, with a smile reserved only for 007 and morbid morticians.

Q sighs and lowers the photo printouts. They’ve been at this for half an hour. He should know by now that James Bond has the attention span of a hyperactive child in a toy store, but this is _important._

"Sardonic comments, believe it or not, are not going to get M to sign off on releasing you back into the field."

"This isn't working," Bond articulates his words slowly. Behind his cool ice blue eyes, Q can sense a Molotov cocktail of frustration ready to blow.

"There's no quick fix," Q argues. "It's all elbow grease and hard work. Unless..."

"I'm listening."

Q shifts in his spot. "I've been working on contacts lenses synced with our database...ideally, the digital mainframe of the lens would do all the identification work for you. Providing they're in our system and haven't undergone complete facial reconstruction." Stranger things have happened.

Bond barely blinks. "Good. We'll use that."

"The downside is, of course, that we'd have access to the lens, like a two way mirror. Essentially, we'd be able to see what you see."

"Fine," Bond says, but the temperature in his voice has dropped a few degrees. In Bond language, Q knows that means he'll "accidentally" lose the lenses five minutes into having them. If there's anything Bond hates worse than a handicap, it's surveillance.

There's a knock on the door. A man comes in with a manila envelope and addresses Q. "Your prototype, sir."

"Great," Bond says as he snatches the envelope from the man's hands. "Thank you."

He's like a child, really, taking things that don't belong to him. Q, half the other man's age, feels like a bad babysitter when James takes off the paperclip at the top of the envelope. "You need to get a new head shot," James says idly as he tosses Q's attached ID card to the desk and pulls a gun out of the envelope.

Q buzzes first with indignation and then with excitement. James _recognized_ his face in the image. "Bond," he says, practically vibrating. "You--"

"Is this for 009?" James grasps the gun and looks down the sight.

"It's enhanced with fingerprint recognition technology, it won't work for you--"

Q should know better than to tell Bond that because his finger immediately moves to the trigger to test the theory. Q reaches over to put his hand over the muzzle, aiming it downward.

“Bond,” Q says, firmly.

James stops and glances up, his eyes meeting Q's.

“It’s just…" Q fumbles for a second like a teenage girl. "You’ve always recognized me. I’m just curious…how.”

“Easily.” Bond sets the gun down on the desk in front of Q. “Your sweaters are atrocious.”

"Ah." They lapse into a brief, charged silence. Their eyes don't break contact and whatever Q really wanted to say dies on his tongue.

"Are we done?" Bond asks.

"I'd say so."

"Right." Bond rises, swift and svelte, and says as he leaves, "Evening, Q."

"See you first thing tomorrow," Q reminds him.

The room seems to expand without Bond in it and Q collects his images. He knows now what he's always known--that James Bond is an enigma he'll never fully comprehend. And yet, sometimes--

He can be so damn predictable. The folder is empty, the gun is gone.

"Bond!" Q shouts as he scrambles out from his desk and after the agent. But Bond, of course, is already lost in the shadows.


End file.
